2014 Draft Policy - what you can do

The five boards closed five consultations on one document on the 27th June 2014 - a new policy they hoped to implement throughout Northern Ireland. The policy now under consultation includes many requirements outside the Board's legal powers, including:

- entry into the home without suspicion of wrong doing

- access to the child

- limits on the parents legal duty to provide an education including delays to deregistration and restrictions on the form of education provided

A legal challenge could be mounted were the Education Authority ever to try and impose such a policy. As the law stands at present, there is no power for this type of rule to be implemented by means of local consultation. These changes cannot be brought in without going through the full legislative process first.

We are hopeful that having abandoned the initial draft and having engaged with HEdNI in the Working Group on new guidance, we will see the release of constructive and legally accurate guidance by September 2017.